Observer News: Nine years after Nine-Eleven
Nine years after Nine-Eleven
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Mitch_Traphagen on 09/09/2010 04:06:35
By Mitch Traphagen
mitch@observernews.net Above, a child’s note of remembrance taped to the
window of an NYPD substation near Times Square in 2001. Below, support from
Pasco County residents in the days following the attacks. (Mitch Traphagen
Photos) The solemn ceremonies have begun to fade away in many parts of the
nation. People are healing but few, if any, have forgotten. Saturday marks the
ninth anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United
States.
In Washington, D.C., the Pentagon has long since been repaired. The work was
done in the manner that is expected of the United States Military — quickly
and with efficiency. The Pentagon Memorial stands resolute and solemn, a
permanent and personal memorial to that event and the lives lost that day.
Near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, work continues on a permanent national memorial
for the passengers of Flight 93 who won the nation’s first battle in the war
on terror. On Saturday, First Lady Michelle Obama and former First Lady Laura
Bush will join together at the western Pennsylvania site to mark the
anniversary.
In New York City, years were spent deciding on how best to replace the World
Trade Center and the site, known as Ground Zero, remained like an open wound on
Lower Manhattan. In what seemed like a blink of the eye, all of that has
changed. According to the site owner, the Port Authority of New York and New
Jersey, Ground Zero is rapidly transforming itself into a new rendering of the
World Trade Center. Earlier this month, the first dozen of 400 Swamp White Oak
trees were planted at the site as part of a permanent September 11 memorial
named Reflecting Absence. Construction is well underway on the new 1,776 foot
One World Trade Center building, already towering 36 floors into the sky. A
memorial pool is nearing completion, with plans to have it open for the tenth
anniversary next year, and work is also well underway on what will become one of
the city’s largest transit stations. Seven stories beneath the ground, work
has begun on what will someday be the National September 11 Memorial and Museum,
which will include the last column to remain standing from the twin towers.
Everywhere there is symbolism, from the “survivor’s stairway” that was
salvaged from the original site that will be available for public use in the
future, to the the height of One World Trade Center which reflects the
nation’s year of independence. There is also a dramatic display of recovery.
In addition to maintaining the memories, business will go on at the site as the
four towers making up the World Trade Center rise from the ashes. There is
respect and remembrance; but there is no air of defeat.
The city’s annual commemoration of the day involves reading the names of those
who perished, along with a procession of family members into the pit that was
known as Ground Zero. Today, nine years later, it is less a pit and more a
resolute new beginning.